This invention relates to a method for separating continuously scrawled hand-written numerical figures so as to secure efficient recognition thereof.
A recognition method for reading out one numeral written within a predetermined frame has been almost completely established in the optical character reader (OCR) technology. However, the level of presently available systems is not sophisticated enough to recognize numerical figures which were written by a writer who did not expect his or her numerals to be read by an OCR. Numerical figures (hereinafter referred to as "numerical figures written by hand in free-pitch without a frame") of plural bits which are hand-written freely in a large frame in which the writer did not expect the figures to be read out by an OCR system, tend to be running and continuous to each other. There has been no method publicly known which can efficiently discriminate such scrawled connected numerical figures, and demands have mounted for the development of such a technique.